


illuminated

by Liu



Series: something in the water [3]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Break Up, F/M, Gen, Iris breaks up with Eddie, Lots of Angst, M/M, and this series has Barry/Eddie endgame so if you don't like it, feel free to stick to the truly het fics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-02
Updated: 2015-01-02
Packaged: 2018-03-04 22:44:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3094784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liu/pseuds/Liu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-ep09.</p><p>Iris figures out she can't move in with Eddie.</p>
            </blockquote>





	illuminated

**Author's Note:**

> I felt bad that I couldn't bring myself to like Iris... so I chose to write a fic from her point of view to force myself to think about her in a different light. It kinda worked... but if she sounds ooc to you, I'm sorry in advance.
> 
> Not really a 'beddie' fic, but it fits into the events of this series... can be read as a standalone.
> 
> Edit: So apparently it works better as a part of the series, not as a oneshot XD sorry ^^;

The velvet box scrape-slides over the surface of the table as Iris pushes it away; it’s probably the longest five inches she’s ever had to cover, but she knows it has to be done.

The blue of Eddie’s tie is reflected in his shock-wide eyes as he glances up, searching her face for clues. She knows he can’t find all the answers there, so she opens her mouth, tries to remember all of her carefully thought-out words.

“I can’t move in with you,” she opens with the gist of it, and she can see the hurt in Eddie’s face, all the cutting, bitter replies he won’t say out loud. Did it take you two weeks to figure that out? What did I do? What did _you_ do?

In the end, he settles for a quiet ‘why’.

“Barry,” she replies softly, and there’s a flash of something in his eyes, but she can’t linger on that – her head is already a swirling storm of thoughts and ideas and questions, no space left for decoding any further problems.

“Did he say he wasn’t okay with you moving in?” Eddie frowns, and it’s more confusion than irritation, really… another point in case, the way Iris sees it.

She shakes her head:

“No. But… I think… he did ask me if we weren’t moving too fast, and… I think he might be right.”

This is harder than she expected – and she did not expect this to be easy at all. She swirls a spoon in her coffee, even though she takes it with no sugar; it gives her something to do with her hands, something to focus on as she tries to sort out her thoughts. Last night was full of tossing and turning and staring into the darkness of her room, trying to pick the right answers out of thin air, and yet, she’s left grasping at every word and feeling it’s the wrong one.

Eddie leans back, like it pains him to stay too close to her right now, like he can see better from a distance – maybe that’s their problem, hers and his. They both see better when they’re not too involved… they both see better when it’s not about Barry.

“Is this you worrying we’re too ‘real’?” he asks, and she wants to cry because of how tentative, how calm he sounds. It’s her own words, and he could be throwing them back at her with much more force, much more spite, but he just…  asks, like he can somehow make it better if only she makes him understand. Iris knows he’ll give her all the space she needs if she just asks – and that’s what makes this even harder. She briefly wonders if she might be selfish to be having this conversation, if she shouldn’t just keep quiet and let things resolve on their own… but that kind of approach has never really worked for her, so she soldiers on.

“No, I… I figured out ‘real’ isn’t that scary after all,” she gives him a small smile, but it’s not a happy one and he can see that. A deep breath should make it easier to push the words out, so she takes one and almost cringes as she continues: “But I think I’m not the kind of ‘real’ you want. Not all of it, anyway.”

“You could trust me to make my own decision about what I want.”

He’s right, of course he’s right, but the thing is… she’s got her father’s genes for picking up a scent and not letting go until it leads somewhere. And the pieces she’s been picking up lately fall into place to form a certain picture.

“I think,” she starts again, even though she knows he’ll get mad, “I think you like Barry too.”

Eddie looks like she’s dropped a bombshell on his head, and his mouth’s already opening to protest – she just knows he’s going to say that she’s wrong, and if he does, she’s all too prone to believe him and laugh it off… and she can’t afford to do that. Not before she’s said what she needs to get off her chest: so she raises her hand.

“No, please, Eddie… just hear me out, alright? Barry… he confessed to me.”

She cried for hours after he’d gone, cried for the boy who grew up loving her from afar, never saying a word, for a boy who became a man thinking he wasn’t worth of her love. She wouldn’t have said ‘yes’ – she always saw him as a brother, a friend; but maybe he would’ve been happier, less lonely, if she could’ve said ‘no’ years and years ago. And a part of her cried because Barry said it like he was at the end of one chapter of his life, like he had already resigned before talking to her and he just needed to say it to get closure. He never asked her for an answer – never really posed it as a question, and she cried for the boy she had unknowingly warped so badly that even when he found the courage to confess to the girl he apparently loved for most of his life, he did it by way of an apology, seeking an ending rather than a beginning.

Eddie doesn’t say ‘I told you so’, even though he really, really could. Iris wonders why is it that they’re both so keenly observant of anyone else, but when it comes to loving Barry Allen, they’re both completely blind.

And that’s what this is really about - they both love Barry too much, and too differently.

“I don’t feel that way about Barry,” she clarifies – Eddie gives her a skeptical look, and she sighs. “He’s my best friend, and I can’t imagine my life without him, but that’s it. And he knows that. But… it helped me figure out a few things. And I think… one day you could love him more than I ever will.”

It hurts to say the words – she’s not sure if the pain comes from thinking about not being capable of loving Barry the way he deserves, or from the thought that Eddie will love someone else in the future. And he will; she’s certain of it. She’s just not willing to wait around in his apartment to see it happen.

Eddie’s voice is blank and quiet in a way that makes her heart ache even more.

“What…?”

There’s no turning back now. She sips her lukewarm coffee and the taste grounds her a little, but she can’t erase the words that still hang in the air. Maybe that’s good – maybe if she keeps blocking her own escape route, she will manage to the very end.

“Eddie… we’ve been together for nearly a year. And ever since Barry woke up… you’ve been different. At first, I was glad that you two got along, but… that’s not all it was, is it,” she smiles a little again, striving for understanding – but color still drains from Eddie’s face as he leans over the table again, frowning:

“I’m not in love with Barry, I’m in love with _you_! I don’t know how you came up with this-“

“I can see you looking at him,” she interrupts – she knows she should give him space to talk as well, but if she doesn’t say it all, if she lets his earnest, anxious eyes burn right into her heart again, she’ll chicken out and that’s not an option here. Her gut’s telling her that what she’s doing is right; nonetheless, it doesn’t make this any easier.

He flinches, but keeps quiet… she’ll take small victories where she can, even though she wouldn’t call it a victory to see the whirlwind of hurt in his face.

“Eddie,” she says his name, like it will make him understand; she longs to reach out and touch his curled-up fingers to soothe him. But she’s balancing the thin line of that not being her right anymore, so she keeps her hand to herself and continues trying to make sense of this in words.

“I’m not accusing you of anything. This isn’t about whether or not I trust you – and I do,” she assures him – it’s true, she still trusts him more than anyone beside her father and Barry, and she hopes more than anything that this is right, and that he will not hate her, or disappear from her life. “This is… the way you look at him… when we’re together, you and me, you look content, but when Barry appears, it’s like you can’t help it, and… I can’t give him what he wants from me, but you might.”

“So you’re saying that because you aren’t romantically interested in your best friend, _I_ should be?” he scowls, hurt twisting into irony just a little bit, and the words cut her when she realizes he might be right, partly. With a sigh, she looks away for a moment to collect her thoughts, to figure out how much of what Eddie’s saying is the core of the problem. Not much, she finds in the end… it’s on the margins, the guilt that she didn’t know about Barry’s feelings until he told her, the guilt that Eddie, who’s known Barry for just a few months, could see it all clearer than her. But it’s not guilt that makes her push Eddie away… she’s not even sure if that’s what she’s doing. It feels like setting him free, a little, but she’s not going to romanticize this – it’s a breakup, and it hurts, and maybe it’ll be better in the long run, but the abrupt and painful end of _them_ will always be her doing, her _fault_.

“I’m saying that there’s something between you and Barry, and I think you should figure that out without me cluttering up your space.” The words steady her, coming out more determined, more certain than she actually feels, and finally, she’s managed to say at least one thing the way she really means it.

Maybe that’s why she’s a little surprised when Eddie only frowns deeper, shakes his head:

“What do you _want_ from me, Iris? Is this a break-up or… not? Because right now, it sounds like you want me to ‘figure out’ something with your best friend while waiting for me to come back to you anyway and ask you to move in with me later. How do you think that’ll work?”

“I… have no idea,” she deflates, and Eddie sighs, running his hand down his face wearily.

“Me neither. I have no idea what you’re asking here… look, if you don’t want to move in, that’s fine, I get it, we can slow down-“

“No,” she whispers, tears pressing up against her throat and making it difficult to speak. He’s such a good guy… the best she could ask for, but she can’t take it all back now, can’t make him gravitate towards her with the same infallible force he does towards Barry. It’s like they’re two magnets drawn to each other, closing in on the other’s presence from across any space, any room, and it hurts to watch.

“No?” he repeats. “No, you don’t want to move in, or no, you don’t want to slow down?”

“No,” she says again, trying to make her voice work again without cracking too much. “I love you, Eddie, but… I’m not _all_ you want, and… maybe Barry isn’t either, I don’t know. But the way you two look at each other… I can’t believe it took me this long to see it.”

“Is this your final word?” he asks quietly, and Iris can’t force herself to look at him, because his voice is painful enough. “This is it? We’re breaking up, just like that?”

“No,” she breathes, then clenches her teeth for a moment. She doesn’t want him to go, she wants him all for herself, but that’s not what she’s getting and she’s selfish enough to bet on the ‘all or nothing’ card. All she wants is some time apart, but they’ve been together for almost a year and she knows by now that’s not how Eddie operates. If she asks for that, he’ll just wait around and try to prove to her how much he loves her, and she’ll break and they’ll get back together, and Iris will still be hurting Barry without even trying, watching two out of three most important men in her life eye each other from across the room. “Yes.”

If there’s one thing she’s glad of, it’s that they’re alone in the coffee shop. His chair scrapes loudly over the floor she still has to sweep, and out of the corner of her eye, Iris can see his coat and scarf disappear from the back of that chair. His steps are quiet, quick, and she doesn’t look up from her cold coffee when the bell tolls for his departure.

He left the velvet box behind. The dark outline of it blurs in her vision when her eyes flood with the tears she’s been keeping back, and then she takes it home with her, because it would be irresponsible to just toss a key away like that. She hides it in the back of her closet, wondering if she’ll ever stop _knowing_ so acutely that it’s there.

Eventually, she does; it’s not in a week, and it’s not in a month. In the end, when she needs to find it again, it takes her almost an hour to fish it out of all the old socks and sweatshirts and high school memories. She leaves it on Eddie’s desk then, returns the key together with Eddie’s favor from long ago and doesn’t say ‘I told you so’. Barry might not know why she’s smiling at his keys a few days later, but that’s okay.


End file.
